


Not With Us, then Against Us

by theStarfly



Series: Fantastic Fanatic [1]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Conflicted Grindelwald, Death Sentence, Extended Scene, Gen, Grindelwald has a Crush, Movie Spoilers, POV Percival Graves, POV Third Person Limited, Regret, questionable morality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-05
Updated: 2016-12-05
Packaged: 2018-09-06 14:41:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8756587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theStarfly/pseuds/theStarfly
Summary: Gellert Grindelwald has never before been so torn apart.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This collection is of genfic for Fantastic Beasts. While there is some hinting at pairings, none of it will be explicitly written.

It wasn’t often Percival Graves doubted the decisions he made in compliance with his better-known persona of Grindelwald in mind. He was, after all, one and the same. Just because he wore his preferred salt-and-pepper hair and more chiseled face while masquerading as the Director of Magical Security at MACUSA didn’t mean that his internal motives changed even the least bit.

He, Gellert-Percival Grindelwald-Graves wanted only one thing; that is, and was, freedom from the solitude of hiding for all magical people, fair treatment of the wizarding population as just as human as any of the rest of them, and hope for the new generations of witches and wizards to come that they would not need to repress their magic and hide their true selves from friends, magical or not.  
That so many had to die to achieve his goals was, well, regrettable. But cull those who might disagree from both sides of the magical/non-magical barrier, and you were left with like-minded folks who truly had the best future in mind for all people.

However, for the first time, Graves was uncertain he had made the right decision. There was a lot of weight on his shoulders— the weight of a million unchained futures, but for the first time, he wondered if the weight, the cost, might be too great. He had always been fond of Tina, for as long as he had been at MACUSA. He had hoped that her demotion would deter her from showing up when least-expected and least-wanted, in the hopes he wouldn’t need to move to more drastic measures. But somehow, he’d always expected to have to kill her. No, Tina’s death, while regrettable, was not the problem.  
Newt Scamander, however. Newt was an unexpected twist to his fairly straightforward plan. Newt brought something to the wizarding community that it desperately needed. Something it was not yet prepared to accept. He saw a good deal of his younger self in the young man, with an added layer of complexity he had failed to achieve in his more youthbound years. The lack of complexity had been what had driven he and Albus apart so many years before— that the young man had caught his lover’s attention would be interesting enough, even had he not also caught Percival’s own. The idea that such spirit, such energy, would be snuffed out entirely, free-will dropped into a pool of poison so corrosive as to kill, before urging him to step in was.  
Well. It was unspeakable.  
Percival knew that the young man knew, could tell from the pointed poke at himself about being one of “Grindelwald’s fanatics,” oh, but the young man was cunning. In another world, another time… had he gotten to him sooner… but he had to go. To protect Grindelwald. To protect his mission. His mission was more important than its components, than Grindelwald himself. It was more than each of its parts combined.  
But, oh, for the first time in a very long time, how Gellert Grindelwald wished he could have someone, this specific someone, by his side, as he ushered their world into a new and better future era.

“Just do it immediately. I will inform President Picquery myself.” Finger pressed to his lips, he waves the executioners forward. Take them. “Please.” He can’t bear the thought of watching this man perish.

The machine was already running. Scamander had come too late, and whomever was not with them… was against them.


End file.
